


Your fingertips are falling far from where I know

by illuminatedcities



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Asexual Character, Established Relationship, M/M, Masturbation, ace!Harold
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-12
Updated: 2015-05-12
Packaged: 2018-03-30 06:43:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3926794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/illuminatedcities/pseuds/illuminatedcities
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Show me,” he says, and this time he’s not asking and it’s perfect, like when John is out there just relying on Harold’s orders in his ear, his compass, his entire sense of direction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Your fingertips are falling far from where I know

It’s a lazy Sunday afternoon the first time Harold brings it up: They are stretched out on Harold’s bed, Bear curled up in a puddle of sunlight in the living room, chewing on a plastic toy. 

 

John is sitting with his back against the headboard with Harold leaning against his shoulder, propped up by a pillow. The newspaper he’s reading is spread out over both their laps. 

 

John has a hand at the nape of Harold’s neck, thumb stroking in idle circles. It’s not that Harold doesn’t like touch, John has found: He likes the way John strokes his shoulders through his shirt and vest, he’s fond of kissing and curling up against John in bed, tucking himself close against him. 

 

“Maybe you’d like to show me how you pleasure yourself,” Harold says, apropos of nothing, and John’s skin flushes all the way down to his throat.

 

“Would that be alright?” Harold asks when John doesn’t say anything. “We have been spending a lot of time figuring out what it might be that I need, and I feel that it’s time to do the same for you.”

 

Harold folds his newspaper back into a neat shape and puts it away before turning bodily to look at John.

 

“Would you like that?” Harold asks. 

 

“Yes,” John manages, his mouth suddenly very dry. 

 

He gives Harold a shaky smile and unbuckles his belt, the blood pooling low and hot in his belly with just the thought of what he is about to do. 

 

Harold scoots back a few inches on the bed to get a better view, head tilted curiously, taking him in.

 

“Harold, are you sure this is something you’re comfortable with?” John says, a pained expression on his face.

 

Harold gives him a look that is so gentle that John has to avoid his eyes for a moment because it makes something inside of his ribcage clench painfully. 

 

“I take great pleasure in watching you, John,” Harold says, like it’s that easy, and John goes to his knees, bends down and kisses him, a brief peck on the lips, before settling back in against the headboard. 

 

John’s hands are trembling under Harold’s gaze when he draws down the zipper and pushes his pants and underwear down, completely exposed. 

 

He takes a deep breath, marveling at how erotic it feels to him to get undressed while Harold is still buttoned up right to his pocketsquare. He loses his shirt and undershirt, too, and throws them across the bed. The sheets feel cool and pleasant against his naked back and thighs. 

 

John is hard, but doesn’t feel too urgent about it yet, not with the way Harold is studying him. 

 

“What do you enjoy?” Harold asks, and John is so dazed already that the question doesn’t compute immediately.

 

Harold’s lips twitch, not unkindly. “When you’re masturbating. What do you like to do?”

 

John isn’t like Harold with his armor made out of words, talking doesn’t come easily to him. He always struggles for expressions, ways to pin down exactly what he’s trying to communicate. 

 

Putting into words how he likes to touch himself seems like an almost impossible task.

 

“I mostly just –“ he waves his hand a little, indicating his erection, and Harold gives him a long-suffering expression that makes John laugh.

 

Granted, he could be making more of an effort.

 

He leans back, hands at his sides, and thinks about it some more.

 

“It’s usually stress relief,” John says. “It feels distracting, sometimes, to go for too long without getting off, like skipping your morning run a few times. It’s pretty quick, just about releasing pressure, jerking off quickly in the shower usually does it.”

 

“Why the shower?” Harold asks, sounding genuinely curious.

 

John wants to ask him “Do you never…?” but it’s such an obvious smokescreen to get himself out of the spotlight that he just files away the thought for later. It’s not uncomfortable to talk to Harold like this, it’s just something he isn’t used to, to have somebody care so much.

 

“It’s efficient, I guess. Easy cleanup, too, less mess,” John says, shrugging.

“How very practical,” Harold observes. “It’s not about pleasure then, at all?”

 

John can hear no judgement in the question, but he feels his stomach tighten anyway. 

 

There’s a different kind of release involved, sometimes: 

 

When he can still hear Harold’s voice in his ear, remember the way Harold’s suit felt under his fingertips, when Harold gave him a tight-lipped smile and John wanted to push him against the bookshelves of the library.

 

“Sometimes it is,” John says cautiously. 

 

Harold seems content with that answer.

 

“Show me,” he says, and this time he’s not asking and it’s perfect, like when John is out there just relying on Harold’s orders in his ear, his compass, his entire sense of direction.

 

He considers showing off a little, stroking down his chest and thighs or lingering on his belly, the dark trail of curls leading down from the navel. In the end he just settles for closing his hand around his cock and stroking up and down in a lazy rhythm, much like he would do alone in his apartment, the sheets bunched up around his legs.

 

“Is this – do you enjoy me watching you get off?” Harold asks like he is actually not sure, and John’s chuckle turns into a groan when he catches Harold’s eyes while the skin of his palm is sliding over senstive flesh, a rush of adrenaline like a rooftop chase. 

 

“Yeah, Harold, I do,” John says. 

 

Harold seems to consider that.

 

“Would you prefer me actually taking part in any way?” 

 

John tries to imagine Harold, hell-bent on making Grace happy and giving her everything she could possibly wish for, training himself to look happy, satisfied, when really he was stuck inside of his own head the entire time.

 

“You are. You’re here,” John says, keeping up the steady strokes, his hips moving restlessly against his hand.

 

This is already much better than everything he has ever done in the privacy of his own room, his head filled with longing that tasted like ash in his mouth when he had realized that he could never have what he wanted. 

 

“John,” Harold says, and John shudders when he hears his name out of Harold’s mouth, a tight knot of pleasure coiling at the base of his spine. 

 

He spreads the drops of precome on the head of his cock with his thumb, pushes up into the tight ring of his hand until he feels that he’s close, so close, and then Harold says his name again, impossibly soft, and John comes, spilling over his hand and stomach, shaking with pleasure and relief.

 

He must have zoned out for a second, because the next thing he sees is Harold next to him, putting a warm washcloth to his skin that smells of soap, cleaning him up, and John makes a weak noise of protest until Harold says “Please, let me,” and John relaxes against him.

 

“Was that alright, John?” Harold asks later, both of them curled up in the sunlight, John dozing off against Harold’s shoulder, sleepy and content.

 

John wants to open his mouth and say that it would be enough, that if Harold never touched him again for as long as he lived it would still be enough; but maybe that’s not what it’s about at all: Maybe devotion isn’t measured in how much you’re willing to give up for someone, the wide open spaces that you carve out in your life, but instead by what you manage to fill them with. 

 

“Yes,” John says, and he knows that it might not sound like a confession to everyone else, like three different words entirely, but he knows that Harold hears him every time.

 

Harold smiles.

 

“Me too, John,” he says.


End file.
